I watched the first of the two debates involving ten of the twenty people who qualified for it. Given the large number, the two-hour time allowed for an average of about ten minutes per candidate and each was given just one minute to respond to questions. So it was unreasonable to expect a detailed examination of candidate positions since they all largely agreed on how to respond to the issues that were raised, with the possible exception of John Delaney who seemed more like a Republican, touting his credentials as a businessman.
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After Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez won a shock primary victory over long-time Democratic establishment incumbent Joe Crowley for the congressional seat in Queens, NY, the party leaders were determined not to let themselves be blindsided again. So when Tiffany Cabán, described as a “31 year old, Democratic Socialist, queer, Latinx public defender”, challenged the party machine candidate Melinda Katz for the position of district attorney on a progressive platform, they pulled out all the stops. And yet yesterday, Cabán won.
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Over in the UK Boris Johnson, the man strongly favored to win the contest for the Conservative party leadership and thus take over from Theresa May as prime minister, has found himself in an awkward situation when neighbors called the police because they heard angry words and loud noises from the apartment where his girlfriend was living. Johnson is apparently estranged from his wife and was staying with her. The police came and then left without taking any action after being reassured that everything was fine.
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The knock against this candidate for the Democratic nomination has been that he lacks substance and a proven record and that he is merely coasting on his narrow loss to Ted Cruz in the Texas senate race. But he recently put forward on interesting idea and one that should be pushed even further than he envisages.

Beto O’Rourke on Monday called for Congress to enact a “war tax” any time the country goes to war, with the proceeds going to care for veterans of the conflict.
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If elected, O’Rourke said he would push Congress to enact a law creating a new trust fund for veterans’ health care for every war the U.S. fights. Each fund would be paired with a war tax, which O’Rourke’s campaign said would be “implemented on a progressive basis.”

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He points out that Trump helped create the Iran crisis and that launching bombs and missiles against another country is an act of war and, in a voice dripping with sarcasm, reminds her that under the constitution, only the Congress has the power to declare war and that the president can only use military force in an emergency that calls for immediate defensive action, and that no one thinks that the situation with Iran fits that category.

“It’s like somebody setting fire to a basket full of paper and then putting it out. He helped create the crisis, and then he stopped the attacks,” Sanders said in an interview with “Face the Nation” host Margaret Brennan on Saturday. The full interview will air on “Face the Nation” this Sunday.

Sanders accused Mr. Trump of thinking “that a war with Iran is something that might be good for this country.” When Brennan pointed out that the strike considered by Mr. Trump was “limited,” Sanders responded sarcastically.

“Oh, just a limited strike. Oh, well, I’m sorry. I just didn’t know that it’s okay to simply attack another country with bombs,” Sanders said, incredulously. “Just a limited strike? That’s an act of warfare.”

It is extraordinary how the media simply buys into the way that the administration and the war hawks frame these issues.

The vicious anti-immigrant rhetoric of Donald Trump has mainstreamed the views of neo—Nazis and white supremacists and thus created a window for ordinary people to express in public discriminatory language against anyone whom they view as not belonging. The city of St. Cloud in Minnesota is one of those places that has been having problems with some of the white residents resenting recent Somali immigrants and abusing them in public.
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In a major setback to Turkey’s increasingly authoritarian president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan who has sought to undermine the country’s long secular tradition, the opposition coalition candidate, Ekrem İmamoğlu won a big victory in a rerun of the mayoral election, after Erdoğan’s ruling party had his earlier narrow victory annulled because of alleged improprieties.

Shortly after initial results pointing to a landslide win for the opposition coalition candidate, Ekrem İmamoğlu, emerged on Sunday evening, the candidate of the ruling Justice and Development party (AKP), Binali Yıldırım, conceded and congratulated his rival.

The repeat election, designed to undo İmamoğlu’s narrow surprise win in the 31 March contest, was an unprecedented test for both Turkey’s fragile democratic institutions and Erdoğan’s political future.
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The president issued his congratulations to İmamoğlu on Twitter after initial results showed that with 99% of ballots counted the People’s Republican party (CHP) candidate had increased his lead in March, of 13,000 votes, to an astonishing 777,000, or 54%.

Crowded parties broke out on Istanbul’s main shopping streets and in liberal neighbourhoods.
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İmamoğlu was embraced by voters for a platform which focused on bringing people together across the city’s religious, class and ethnic divides, and was able to paint his new campaign as a battle for the future of Turkish democracy itself.

Turkey still has some way to go to reverse course and head in a more democratic direction. But this is a hopeful sign.

Agnes Callamard is the UN’s special rapporteur who issued a scathing report about the Saudi Arabian government’s involvement in the brutal murder of reporter Jamal Khashoggi inside a Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, saying that there was evidence of high-level involvement in what was a pre-meditated murder and that the role of crown Mohammed bin Salman’s needed to be investigated.

The World‘s reporter Shirin Jaafari scored an interview with Callamard and asked her about the evidence that she saw and how she arrived at her conclusions. Callamard was remarkably frank and forthcoming and the seven-minute interview is illuminating and also damning in its portrayal of how the Saudi government behaved.

Callamard describes what she heard on the audio recordings that were obtained by the Turkish government, where the Saudis casually discuss the planned murder. It is quite extraordinary how coldly and clinically the Saudi officials discussed the planned murder.